I stopped smoking, I lost 43 pounds, and then I had a heart attack.

Milt Rosen has written hundreds of one-liners and many scripts for dramatic shows and situation comedies since coming to California from the Bronx in 1958. In mid-career, two heart attacks and bypass surgery caused him to alter his life style, but he found the situation not without comedy. Rosen lives in Northridge with his wife and two children.

About 18 years ago I was very heavy; I was smoking five packs of cigarettes a day, and my blood pressure was about 180 over 120. I was on a show that was really demanding. One day I went in and quit. I went to a doctor, took pills; my blood pressure went down. I stopped smoking, I lost 43 pounds, and then I had a heart attack.

It was a funny heart attack. I think the more severe the subject, the funnier it can be. I had a brand new Cadillac, and I went out to change a flat tire. My wife said, “Idiot, call the auto club!” I’d never changed a tire. I took out the jack, and I didn’t know how to assemble it. By the time I got the spare out of the well, it weighed about 4,000 pounds.

I was feeling a lot of pain. I said, “I’m having a heart attack.” She called the Fire Department, and they came running over fast because they thought it was the guy next door. He was a fireman.

They put me in the gurney, and I whispered to my wife, “Leave the tire, I’ll fix it when I get home.” When I got to the hospital the elevator wouldn’t work. In my head I said, “I knew I’d die waiting for an up.”

I would get visitors, marvelous visitors. Somebody would stand there with his hands pressed to his heart sighing, “Oh boy.” Or somebody leaning against the wall mumbling, “Why him? Why did it have to be him?”

We got zillions of flowers, so I told my wife, “I’ve got a great idea. Why don’t we just put three out, a big arrangement, a middle arrangement and a little arrangement and we’ll mark them ‘big,’ ‘little’ and ‘medium,’ and we’ll keep the cards. Whoever comes in, we’ll put the card in the right flowers.” And we did that. But we made a mistake with Annette and Arthur because they sent a ‘little’ and we put their card in a ‘big.’ She looked at it and said, “Look at this, Arthur, look what you get for nine dollars.” It was a $50 bouquet.

I found all the humor in it, I think, because I was scared. I didn’t want to fear that kind of death. You know what you fear most when you’re in the hospital? One is, “Will I live?” That’s the most important thing. The second thing is, “Will I be able to work? Be the man of the family?” And the third is, “Will I ever be able to function as a lover? Can I return to the glorious past that I dimly remember?” Those are the three fears.

I was very concerned about my wife, her health, her well-being, her mind. She was at the hospital all the time. I said, “I’d feel much better if you’d take off sometime, go out to dinner. I’ll feel much better, please.” That night she was supposed to be back at 7 and she came in at six minutes past 7 and I said, “Where were you? Why weren’t you here? It’s six minutes after 7.” There was tremendous fear that the marriage is over. And that came in part I think from the guilt. I crippled myself by overeating, by worry, by smoking.

I literally could not be awake and not have a cigarette within four inches of my mouth. My beard must have been weighed down with smoke.

The day I swore off smoking I didn’t smoke that evening, and it was fun, because I was playing a game. I got up in the morning and it was still part of the game. After lunch it hit me. Agony unlike any agony I’d ever known. I wanted to go all over the world sucking in chimneys.

I was inclined to be overweight. I never understood that people see me as a fat person. In my head I’m 40 pounds thinner than I am. I’m gorgeous in essence.

The first week I lost 12 1/2 pounds. I never associated that with health. I do now. I’ll sit down sometimes and see the feast in front of me, and I’ll say, “My God, I don’t do this, because I’m going to die.” I really feel that. I didn’t before my heart attack.